I'm not entirely sure I can do luang Prabang justice with just words and images; it really is one the most visually captivating places I have ever visited. Its a place deeply entrenched in fervent colour, culture, contrast and character. It's a place full of smiles and heart felt welcomes and to be honest somewhere I could spend a very long time indeed. The peninsula of Luang Prabang, hemmed in by the Mekong River to the west and Nham Kang to the East is an area of picturesque charm and somewhere that inherently induces a natural state of calm and reflective contemplation. You could spend a whole day sat perched up on the hillside overlooking the Mekong river, happily watching the boats and indeed the world quietly drift by. Dotted around your vista, high up on the mellow hilltops are golden temples standing strong and resolute in the sunshine; an impressive feat when you consider the tumultuous and violent history of Laos' most recent past.
For the past several centuries, Laos has been the subject of various foreign interventions, most of them bloody and most of them leaving the segregated principalities in a worse state than before. The French, having taken the territory of modern day vietnam back in the 18th century from the Siamese, moved westwards gaining more territory. This area, west of the Mekong river was to be called Laos.
Laos gained full sovereignty back in 1953, however by this time the USA had other plans for the country; in particular, non discriminate carpet bombing, which the US government at the time would support their 'crucial' fight against perceived communism in the region. The aim was to counter the presence of North Vietnamese troops in the country; however, US involvement, aside from taking the lives of many innocent victims and leaving thousands brutally mutilated, the atrocities of the war were to force many more thousands fleeing their own country. The sharp divide in Laos' political governing framework was to result in a communist party takeover, lead by the People's Democratic Republic. (PDR).
Current day and Laos has softened it's socialist experiment in many areas to allow for an injection of much needed foreign investment and business enterprise. Encouragingly, the country was admitted into the regions political brotherhood, Asean in 1997 and was more recently promoted to 'normal trade relations' with the US. Laos currently resides within the Least Developed Country bracket, something the current government has set its goal to change by 2020.
Comments